Snow Crash

gga

My first cyber-punk novel; I haven’t even read any William
Gibson. This was recommended to me over his other novels, including
Cryptnomicon, which I already had. It’s a very good sci-fi novel:
unlike much other sci-fi Snow Crash is both written recently and set
in the quite near future. This book also has another advantage: Neal
Stephenson was a professional programmer and has chosen to write a
book about programming.

As another professional programmer however, I do have to object
somewhat to the depiction of the profession. Stephenson elevates the
cowboy approach to mythical heights. Not something I agree with. But,
it’s a bit of a ridiculous complaint. He gets the terminology right
(even the oft-misused word ‘hacker’); he does understand actual
software engineering techniques; and he hints at software development
being a creative process.

Ultimately, programming is not a spectator activity: there’s a lot of
quiet thought, some esoteric arguments and a small amount of typing. I
can accept jazzing up programming for the sake of the story. Given the
reality.

The future presented is very plausible. Including the interaction
between programmers, corporations and the vast majority of users. It
could very easily be regarded as overly dystopian. The alternative to
the future in this story is that improved technology creates more
engagement amongst the non-technological priesthood part of the
population. There is precedent for taking that view. The novel 1984
is unfortunately implausible as many technologies since have made the
techniques described impractical or impossible: the photocopier, for
one.

Personally, I have seen blogs improving the literacy level of those
writing them. But, ultimately, the Stephenson’s dystopian world is all
too imaginable. I still have fairly negative attitudes towards the
future of technology. It will not save the world.

Aside from the depiction of the future, this book has a fantastic idea
at its centre. It’s an unusual idea, and very well-executed. There are
some distinct echoes of Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly, but only
towards the periphery.

The plot is fairly hackneyed and predictable. The whole ‘murdered
genius leaving behind a trail of clues to pieced together in time to
save the world’ thing is pretty common in sci-fi/fantasy stories.?But
in the end this is not a disappointing novel: a great idea and
well-executed, that rarest of combinations.